I can't say that I am really new to Linux, but I will say that I am not very familiar. I have had some exposure to it over the years but one major hangup has kept me from fully embracing it: wireless! I have not often had the luxury of a wired internet connection.

Recently I popped a live cd into my new laptop, prompted by my general dissatisfaction with Vista (and subconscious desire to rebel against something). To my surprise I was able to connect to my wireless network, no configuration required. I thought that surely this must mean that my wireless card was supported "out of the box" and I could finally kick windows to the curb. Unfortunately after install I am no longer able to connect! Wireless manager continually prompts for my WEP key or pass phrase. I have tried multiple distros and read through countless forums in search of an answer.

I read through the sticky thread and the results of running the commands are attached as text files.

The result of dmesg is too large to attach. Some relevant lines are:

Code:

phy0: Atheros 9280: mem=0xffffc200110c0000, irq=16

Code:

ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): wlan0: link is not ready

Code:

ra0: no IPv6 routers present

Code:

wlan0: authentication with AP 00:1d:7e:45:c2:04 timed out

I tried disabling ipv6 and the above lines are no longer present in the output of dmesg (except for the AP timeout), but I am still unable to connect to my wireless network.

I should note that wireless manager found my network and shows signal. Also, I have a built-in wireless card as well as a PCI Express card that I purchased recently (since the built-in card seemed to be problematic).

Distro: Suse 11.1

Please let me know if there is any other info that might help! Also, I am interested in knowing the technical details, if anyone feels compelled to share. At the moment I just need to get this laptop up and running ASAP!

08-20-2009

waterhead

Hello, please provide the following information:

Code:

uname -r

Code:

lspci -knn

Code:

lsmod

If you go to the second post in THIS THREAD, there is a script that when run will give most of the info needed. It won't give the full dmesg output.

And because you have two wireless cards, the full output of this:

Code:

dmesg

Instead of posting text files, copy the files contents and paste them into your post. Surround them with "code tags", the easiest way is type [code] at the beginning of the text, and [/code] at the end. You can also highlight the text and use the # sign at the top of the post entry .

The Atheros would use the ath9k driver. The Ralink will use the proprietary driver RT2860, which appears to be installable from Suse repositories. I would wait until attempting to install it from that link, as it may already be installed. It does appear to need firmware, so that MAY be the problem.

08-20-2009

mattheyan

Thanks!

I will do this as soon as I get back from work, which should be pretty soon.

is there a reason you can't just enter the wep key ? my a t and t modem it's just physically on a sticker on the bottom of the modem, or just log into the modem and it should be there.

08-21-2009

mattheyan

I know the WEP key and have windows machines that can connect no problem. I was also able to use the WEP key to connect using the live disc.

08-21-2009

waterhead

My theory on why wireless worked on the LiveCD, but not on an install is this:

You currently have two wireless drivers loading. The ath9k and rt2860sta. The ath9k is an open source driver, where the rt2860sta is a proprietary driver from Ralink. Most Linux distros will not include proprietary driver by default, but they are added after installation.

Using this logic, I deduct that the ath9k was available in the Live CD. The presence of the rt2860sta driver in the install must be interfering with the ath9k. I would try to remove the module, and see if the ath9k (wlan0) will then work.

Code:

sudo modprobe -r rt2860sta

You may want to remove the ath9k module too, and then reload it.

Code:

sudo modprobe -r ath9k

Code:

sudo modprobe ath9k

If you system doesnt\'t use sudo, then gain root privileges using the su command.